Carpe Diem
by Feistee
Summary: Response to S4 finale. All he needs is a push, and she'll be there to give it to him.
1. Chapter 1

**Carpe Diem**

**A/N - After a long writing drought, I'm trying to find some time to churn out a response to the weird character turns of Season 4. I agree this season has easily been the weakest so far (Season 2 was by far my favourite), but I still love to watch the show because I fell in love with the characters years ago, and so I hope the writers realize that Season 5 needs a revamp back to the emotional core that was Bones. This is a vague multi-chapter attempt to rationalize Brennan's wish to get her hands on Booth's sperm, and the characters actions in general. I'm not the biggest fan of Sweets, who seems to only be a huge plot device in 90% of the situations he's in (aka randomly hanging out at the Jeffersonian as if he has no other duties in his full time job at the FBI), but I am attempting to use him here.**

**Sorry about the rant, it ends now! Reviews are greatly appreciated. This starts between 'The Critic in the Cabernet' and the 'The End in the Beginning'. I will be conveniently forgetting weird-ass-alternate-reality BB, and instead focusing on the characters' response to Booth's illness.**

--

It kept playing in her mind, a never ending loop. The glaring white lights hanging over head as they pushed the gurney past the point of no return. The nervous and watery smiles they shared in a shallow attempt of reassuring each other. His countdown before he finally slipped under the anesthesia, caught somewhere between dreams and darkness. She hoped he was dreaming.

"Dr. Brennan?"

Her head snapped up, expecting a doctor. Expecting the worst. "Sweets," she breathed with relief.

"The others said they would come back tomorrow. I literally had to push Angela out the door to make her get some rest," he said, settling himself down in the seat across from her. "Since visitor hours are over soon, I was wondering if you wanted a ride home. It's getting pretty late."

She glanced at the clock that was ticking closer towards 11:30. "But the sign said that they were extended until 2 am on Fridays."

Sweets shook his head as he stifled a yawn with the back of his hand. "That's for family only, I'm afraid."

Brennan's shoulders sagged with defeat, but she remained seated, intent on staying as long as possible.

"But don't worry," Sweets needlessly assured her. "Cam already called Rebecca. They're cutting their vacation a little short, but she and Parker will be here tomorrow."

This irked her. Did this distinction make her far less important to Booth than the other people he cared about? She saw no such difference between friends and family, it was all semantics in her mind. But she knew her experiences and point of view were atypical. Throughout her life, friends had often been a pillar of strength when family was absent. In contrast, with the exception of his father, Booth held the familial experience very close to heart. Undoubtedly, the distinction between friends and family _was_ important to him.

"How long were you planning on doing this?" Sweets asked suddenly, breaking her from her reverie.

"11:30. Obviously," Brennan replied evenly.

She was exhausted, having woken up at 5 am that morning to get an early start in the lab. She caught a glance of herself in the mirror on the far wall. Her hair was thrown up in a mess of a ponytail, and the dark circles under her eyes were startlingly apparent against her skin. And she only looked half as bad as she felt.

"No," he chuckled, fluidly crossing his ankle over his knee. "I mean the forensic talents you lend to the bureau. What started out as a very minor undertaking has quickly become the focus of your career. Do you ever plan to shift your focus back to conventional anthropology?"

The shift in conversation was evident. Brennan treaded carefully, weary of Sweets' tendency to psychoanalyze every answer, or even worse, the lack of one. "I suppose I've never thought about it."

"Oh, I think you have," Sweets insisted, sitting forward in his chair. "The fact that Agent Booth hasn't already moved onto a more senior position within the bureau, one that keeps him off the field, is quite astonishing, and you know that. In fact, I think that is what prompted your desire to have a child with him. A decision like that happening on a whim during a word game? For someone as rational as you, that's ridiculously impractical."

"That's preposterous," Brennan protested.

"Clearly," he continued, unfazed, "a child is a way to cement a connection. Something that space and time cannot diminish."

Brennan set her jaw and glared as she rose from her seat. "I'll drive myself home."

"Dr. Brennan," he called after her. "I'm speaking as your friend…not your therapist."

Against her better judgment, she allowed her expression to soften as they walked out in a dreary silence.

Her terrible mood was reflected by the slight spring drizzle that had accumulated in the greater DC area that evening. The darkness of her apartment was just as unwelcoming, so she trudged right through the lounge and snapped on the lamp in her bedroom. She resisted the urge to collapse immediately on her bed for what would undoubtedly be a fitful sleep, and instead threw on a pair of ratty Northwestern shorts and a t-shirt.

Beneath the unforgiving bright lights in the bathroom she quickly swiped the toothbrush in her mouth. Her knuckles went white from the exertion of grasping the marble counter top as she thought back to Sweets' unwelcome observations. She never gave credence to his, or anyone else's, psychological reasoning, but she found their conversation continuously turning over in her mind.

When she had completed her dissertation years ago, she had very clearly defined goals. She planned to work her way up to medico-legal head at the Jeffersonian, knowing the institution was on the leading edge of research, and certainly had the technological and monetary resources needed to cultivate her talents. Once she had established herself on the academic front, she hoped to settle into a teaching position, and eventually land tenure. For someone so young, she was aware that such accomplishments required an incredible amount of perseverance, but it was nothing that was beyond her abilities.

But to her chagrin, she found herself agreeing with Sweets. Her side project of being a forensic liaison with the FBI now took up the bulk of her time. Her increased presence on the field meant less time in the lab, which ruled out a fast track route to the top of the Jeffersonian's seniority ladder. Suffice to say, in the last few years, academia had taken a back seat to serving the justice system and catching the bad guy. And it was all because of Booth.

The strangest part was she had no regrets. In fact, she was glad that her perfectly designed life had taken all of these unforeseen twists and turns.

She sat on her bed for a time, staring at nothing in particular. When awareness returned, she buried her head in her hands, confused more than ever about everything, except that she needed Booth to be alright.

--

**TBC**


	2. Chapter 2

**Carpe Diem**

**Thank you for all the kind reviews, I really appreciate it. And I apologize for the huge delay, RL sucks.**

----

Blue eyes sought brown as she searched for some sort of recognition. _Who are you?_ His words echoed in her mind, and stupidly, she hoped that this was some strange joke. One that she could not grasp (as so often was the case), and Booth would simply laugh about how he'd duped her. But there was nothing.

"Booth…" she pulled back suddenly.

"Honey, are you alright-" Angela walked into the room, stopping in her tracks when she saw he was awake. "Oh my God!"

He remained passive, tired, as he glanced back and forth from one woman to the other. "I'm sorry…"

"He doesn't remember us," Brennan explained without looking at her friend, the words ringing hollow in her ears.

Angela grasped Brennan's arm. "I'll get a doctor."

As she rushed out of the room, Brennan was nailed to her spot, dumbstruck. She was suddenly aware of the sterile and sharp scent of antiseptic that unwelcomingly wafted from all corners of the room. It was suffocating.

"Do you really not know us? Or who you are?"

Booth tried to bring his hand up to his bandaged head, stopping only as the IV line tugged uncomfortably at his arm. "Seeley Booth," he said easily, though his words were still slurred from all the painkillers they had mercilessly pumped into his system. "And you still haven't answered my question."

Brennan's mind reeled, completely unaccustomed to this cold and unfamiliar doppelganger of her partner. The near-silence was deafening, so she attempted to focus her attention on the steady beeping of the heart monitor, a constant reminder that her partner was alive, but not well.

"Hey, Mr. Booth," Doctor Layton, the assisting surgeon, swept in with a clipboard in tow. "How do you feel?"

"Very slow," he replied.

"You had a procedure to remove a small benign growth from your brain. Everything went smoothly. You don't remember the operation?" Layton was all business, swiping back a page of the clipboard to begin jotting down some notes.

"No."

"But do you recognize your friends?"

Booth's eyes flickered from Brennan, to a very nervous looking Angela, and back again. "No."

"How old are you?"

"36."

"Are you aware you have a son?"

"Parker," Booth said, his eyes finally lighting up.

"Where do you work?"

"The bureau, at the Hoover building in D.C."

It continued like that for a time, the doctor firing off mundane questions, and Booth answering some easily, and some not at all. The rain outside pattered a staccato rhythm against the window, the only sound accompanying the men's voices throughout the grilling session. Finally, Dr. Layton motioned for Angela and Brennan to come out into the hallway after smiling reassuringly to Booth.

"He doesn't remember any of us at the Jeffersonian," Angela sniffed, wiping the back of her hands against her eyes.

"It seems that people or places he's been to in the last several years have become rather muddled in his mind. His son, his life before, he's cognizant of it all. His memories seem to have formed around the gaps and blank spots, like a coping mechanism," Layton explained.

Brennan's throat had become achingly dry, so she managed to croak out, "Is it permanent?"

"I won't say it's impossible, but it's certainly unlikely," he replied, putting a hand to her shoulder. "Patients usually recover from these temporary bouts of amnesia within weeks. It just takes some push, that's all."

Brennan released a breath, and steeled herself for whatever was ahead. She would bring him back.

--

"Well?" gestured Cam, trying to maintain her poise as she waited anxiously. Her feelings were clearly mirrored in her co-workers' faces, and highlighted by restless tapping of Hodgins' foot against the tiled floors.

"No, Cam," Booth said, exasperated as he dropped down into the chair.

Booth's previous encounters with Camille Saroyan were still intact, since they preceded the time period that his amnesia seemed to be affecting. So they thought it might help if she gave him a comprehensive tour of the facilities. A familiar connection between the past and present would hopefully get those synapses firing again.

"How long are they giving you off work?" Hodgins asked, trying to break the uncomfortable silence that had descended upon the group.

Booth studied the other man skeptically, still getting used to the familiar way in which these people were addressing him. "As long as I need, is what they said. So I figure that means a couple months, and then I'm back on duty."

"Where?" Brennan inquired, the curiosity evident in her voice.

"Don't know. Suppose I'll be back in the main criminal investigation unit," he said.

"As in, not here," Angela stated.

Booth shrugged, uncomfortable with the sudden scrutiny. "We'll see." He started picking at the bandages at his head. He had already started forming a new, thin layer of hair against his scalp, but it was itchy and rough against his hands.

"Don't scratch at it!" Brennan chided. For someone so unfamiliar, the idiosyncrasies were frighteningly habitual.

Booth eyes narrowed as he stood suddenly, glancing at the door. "I think I'll head home now."

"Seeley," Cam started, laying a gentle hand on his shoulder. "The doctor said you should spend as much time as you can around these surroundings, to get back into the swing of things."

"Yeah, well," he lowered his voice so that only she could hear, "I kind of feel like I'm in a zoo right now."

He gestured to the others who were staring at him unabashedly, and Cam nodded sympathetically. "All right, let me get my car keys, I'll take you."

It hurt Brennan that Booth would not be asking her for a ride to his apartment, but she knew he had bigger problems, and being chaperoned like a child was one of them. For a man who valued his independence, his inability to get behind the wheel for the next two weeks had been a major annoyance.

As everyone reluctantly headed back to their stations, Booth and Brennan slowly went down the stairs and towards the forensic platform.

"This is a nice place," Booth observed idly, rocking back on his heels.

Brennan nodded, reflecting on the scene around her as the scientists bustled around in that ever-present frenzy to find the empirical truths of the world. "Yes. Though you would never admit it. You always thought it was too prescribed for you."

Booth arched a brow. "Prescribed?"

"Yes," Brennan said simply. "Too…purposeful and needlessly orderly. Though I never understood it. You need a degree of basic cleanliness when working forensic evidence."

To that, Booth's brows furrowed. "I really did work a lot with you, Dr. Brennan, didn't I?"

The use of her formal title and name was a blow, but she managed to shake it off. "Yes, Booth."

He nodded as he tried to soak in the sights and sounds of the lab, and she watched him with keen interest, hoping for a spark of something, anything.

"Dr. Brennan," Cam said, her heels clicking against the tiled floor as she came up behind them. "Could you take Booth back? Michelle took a bad fall during soccer practice, I need to get her from the hospital. They think she might have fractured something."

Brennan looked to Booth for approval and he nodded, but not without hesitation. Cam gave her thanks, rushing out past them in a flurry, her face wrought with a worry that only a new mother could have.

Their walk to the parking garage was uncharacteristically silent until Booth whistled appreciatively. "Nice ride."

Brennan shrugged, opening the Mercedes doors. "Thank you."

He climbed in, folding his tall frame into the coupe. "But not too practical on the inside."

"You never failed to remind me of that," she replied. She hoped that these constant reminders of their conversations, their dynamic, would be the baby steps towards his recovery, but they only seemed to make her feel more miserable.

To that, Booth sighed as he slid the seat back to give himself more room. "I've lost so much," he sighed, sounding understandably downtrodden.

"Yes," she agreed, and she hesitantly put a steady hand on his forearm. "You'll get through this, Booth. You're the strongest person I know."

He met her gaze, swallowing hard, and for the first time since his awakening, he seemed to find some truth and comfort in her words. The moment was broken as she removed her hand, realizing it had been lingering far too long.

They neared his apartment, and Booth piped up again. "Cam says you were in the hospital the whole time."

She turned to him, unsure of how to answer. "Well, that's partially true. I slept at home."

She slowed down the car as they drove down the streets which were still slick with rain from the night before.

"Surgery, coma, recovery," he stated, the intrigue in his voice mirrored by his expression. "That's almost an entire week."

The car rolled to the stop and she shifted in her seat, facing him. "Any of us would have done that for you."

"But _you_ did," he reminded her, and she knew that Booth had come to a realization, one that usually transcended her comprehension. But she was perfectly aware that he finally understood the closeness of their relationship.

"Thank you," he said simply.

"And Booth? This whole thing…" she began hesitantly, "it's like I've lost something too."

"I hope we find it again," he whispered sincerely, before exiting the car.

Brennan gripped her steering wheel as he walked away, feeling heartbroken, a sentiment her old Booth would have known how to chase away.

--

**TBC**


End file.
